Welcoming Visitors to the Farm With Kathy McCaskill
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re joined by Kathy McCaskill, co-owner and operator of in Rembert, South Carolina. McCaskill originally hails from upstate New York, where she grew up on an out-of-operation dairy farm. After marrying, she and her husband bought their South Carolina property and began slowly but surely setting up a livestock operation that sells directly to the local farmers market and from the farm store. Tragedy struck the farm in 2007, when the farmhouse burned down, but McCaskill now sees it as part of a larger plan for her family....
info_outline
Building the Real Organic Project with Linley Dixon
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking to Linley Dixon, an organic vegetable farmer in southwest Colorado. Dixon co-created the , which is a label farmers can add onto the USDA’s certified organic label. “The Real Organic Project is a very grassroots effort,” Dixon said. “Many farmers felt like the USDA organic seal was no longer reflecting the way that they farmed. It started as sort of a rallying cry to make sure that soil health was still fundamental to what could be certified as organic.” The project focuses on growing crops in healthy soils...
info_outline
Experimenting With Whole Milk in Schools With Krista Byler
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking with Krista Byler, the food service director at Union City Area School District in Pennsylvania whose whole milk study caught the attention of the dairy industry. Byler’s district had been offering fat free and 1% milks with student lunches, but thanks to a study conducted by the student council, Byler was aware much of the milk students bought ended up in the trash. On top of that, many students weren’t buying milk at all. “It was kind of a double-edged sword. We had students no longer taking milk and a lot of...
info_outline
Digging Into Climate-Smart Dairy With Carolyn Beans
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking to Carolyn Beans, a freelance science reporter with a focus on food and agriculture. Beans is currently an MIT Environmental Solutions Journalism Fellow. Through the fellowship, she is writing a series on climate-smart dairy that is being published in Lancaster Farming. “The fellowship is designed to support journalists who are working on stories that explore environmental solutions specifically for local audiences,” Beans said. The term climate-smart is a bit of a newer buzzword, but Beans said despite the new...
info_outline
Empowering Women Through Education With Annie's Project
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking to Doris Mold, co-CEO of , a national nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering women in agriculture. Annie’s Project was founded in 2003 and named after Annette Kohlhagen Fleck, a woman who married into farming in 1947 and went on to take care of the business side of the farm. Annie’s Project honors her legacy by providing women with the knowledge and confidence to manage farms and agribusinesses successfully. The organization offers a mix of workshops, courses and online learning aimed at educating...
info_outline
Full Circle Flower Farming With Rebekah Mindel
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking to Rebekah Mindel, a flower farmer and floral designer. Mindel owns Meadow Wilds, a full-circle floral design studio and flower farm in New York’s Hudson Valley. For Mindel, full circle means starting the plants from seed, harvesting and conditioning the flowers and using them in the final designs. “Farming and design for me go hand in hand,” she said. “I wouldn’t want to do one without the other.” Mindel designs floral arrangements for events and wedding using flowers grown on her farm plus purchased...
info_outline
What's Up With the Bees? Protecting Pollinators With Susan Jones
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking to Susan Jones, a pollination expert in McCormick, South Carolina. Jones’ passion for bees grew from an unlikely source: a farrier and third-generation beekeeper visiting her family’s farm began nudging her to give beekeeping a try. He eventually gifted Jones her first two colonies. Those first bees didn’t make it through the winter, but that brief window of time was enough to get Jones hooked, especially when she saw the difference having pollinators made on her garden. “My garden went from OK to on steroids...
info_outline
Tasting What Was Grown in Farm-Made Hot Sauces With Alyssa Adkins
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking to Alyssa Adkins, a produce farmer in Freeport, Maine. Adkins and her partner Nathan Broaddus own Farthest Field Farm where they grow produce and make their own jarred products. The farm specializes in peppers and hot sauces. “My partner and I decided to start with value-added products,” Adkins said. “There’s so many CSAs to choose from, there’s so many farmers selling vegetables at farmers markets. So it kind of made sense for us.” The farm sells five varieties of hot sauces as well as salsas and other...
info_outline
Changing the World for That One Animal With Amy Marciano
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse podcast, we’re talking to Amy Marciano, founder of , a 501(c)(3) non-profit animal rescue in Greentown, Pennsylvania. "I pretty much came out of the womb loving animals. It was just in my DNA," Marciano said. "There's a quote that I pretty much live by, it's basically you can't change the world by rescuing one animal, but for that one animal you change the world." Marciano started her work in Brooklyn, New York, where she founded the Sugar Mutts Dog Rescue in a warehouse. After about a decade in the city, she moved her operation to the Poconos region where she...
info_outline
From Dietitian to Farmer With Jennie Schmidt
FarmHouse
This week on the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking to Jennie Schmidt, a grain and grape farmer on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Prior to farming at Schmidt Farms full time, Schmidt worked as a registered dietitian. “I was able to kind of meld my training,” she said. “I always tell people that farming is the front end of nutrition. They’re the same continuum.” Thanks to her knowledge in both fields, Schmidt was offered speaking engagements, at first with dietitian and nutrition groups. This then led to her speaking nationally at conferences held by groups such...
info_outlineOn this week’s episode of the FarmHouse, a podcast by Lancaster Farming, we’re talking to Lee Rankin, author and owner of Apple Hill Farm in Banner Elk, North Carolina.
Rankin’s journey into agriculture began with an emotional encounter with an alpaca at the Kentucky State Fair.
“It was a moment between the two of us where everything else fell away,” she said, describing the moment she looked into the alpaca’s eyes. “I was like, this is the coolest animal I’ve ever met.”
Rankin followed her newfound dream to North Carolina, where she transformed a mountaintop orchard into an alpaca farm.
In the two decades since, Apple Hill has become a successful fiber farm where Rankin and her team raise alpacas, llamas and angora goats. She sells her products at a store on her farm and at craft and fiber fairs and art festivals.
In addition to the fiber operation, Apple Hill is an agritourism business. Rankin said she’s seen her own first alpaca experience mirrored in the faces of those who visit the farm.
“There’s people that walk in and they pull me aside and they’re like, ‘this is like my dream.’ And I say to them, I’m not responsible for what happens now,” she joked, regarding the would-be farmers she and her animals have inspired.
In 2024, Rankin’s community was dealt a challenging blow in the form of Hurricane Helene when it swept through the state.
Apple Hill sustained damage to four buildings and suffered considerable tree damage, including 20 downed trees across one of its fences.
The community is still rebuilding.
It’s inspiring, she said, describing the way people have stepped up to clear debris, repair damage and take care of each other.
“I’m so proud of our little town of Banner Elk, our little town of Valle Crucis and the way people came together and responded and are still responding on a daily basis,” she said. “The real story is what’s happened on a neighbor by neighbor basis, on a town by town basis. And I mean, it’s just amazing.”
Rankin is also an author. She recently published “Farm Family: A Solo Mom’s Memoir of Finding Home, Happiness, and Alpacas,” a book chronicling her experience of starting Apple Hill while raising her son as a single parent.
“I was 40 when I started the farm, when we moved here. I was 60 when I published that book or started the publication process,” Rankin said of what she wants other women to take away from her story. “We’re never too old to do something and to live a dream.”